Millennium Ecosystem Assessment Findings

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Millennium Ecosystem Assessment Findings
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Largest assessment of the health of the planets
ecosystems

• Experts and Review Process
• Prepared by 1360 experts from 95 countries
• 80-person independent board of review editors
• Review comments from 850 experts and governments
• In addition to global assessment, includes
  information from 33 sub-global assessments
• Governance
• Called for by UN Secretary General in 2000
• Authorized by governments through 4 conventions
• Partnership of UN agencies, conventions,
  business, non-governmental organizations with a
  multi-stakeholder board of directors

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Focus Ecosystem Services The benefits people
obtain from ecosystems
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Focus Consequences of Ecosystem Change for
Human Well-being
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MA Findings - Outline

• 1. Ecosystem Changes in Last 50 Years
• 2. Gains and Losses from Ecosystem Change
• Three major problems will decrease long-term
  benefits
• Degradation of Ecosystem Services
• Increased Likelihood of Nonlinear Changes
• Exacerbation of Poverty for Some People
• 3. Ecosystem Prospects for Next 50 Years
• 4. Reversing Ecosystem Degradation

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Finding 1

• Over the past 50 years, humans have changed
  ecosystems more rapidly and extensively than in
  any comparable period of time in human history
• This has resulted in a substantial and largely
  irreversible loss in the diversity of life on
  Earth

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Unprecedented change Ecosystems

• More land was converted to cropland since 1945
  than in the 18th and 19th centuries combined
• 25 of the worlds coral reefs were badly
  degraded or destroyed in the last several decades
• 35 of mangrove area has been lost in this time
• Amount of water in reservoirs quadrupled since
  1960
• Withdrawals from rivers and lakes doubled since
  1960

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Unprecedented change Biogeochemical Cycles

• Since 1960
• Flows of biologically available nitrogen in
  terrestrial ecosystems doubled
• Flows of phosphorus tripled
• gt 50 of all the synthetic nitrogen fertilizer
  ever used has been used since 1985
• 60 of the increase in the atmospheric
  concentration of CO2 since 1750 has taken place
  since 1959

Human-produced Reactive Nitrogen Humans produce
as much biologically available N as all natural
pathways and this may grow a further 65 by 2050
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Significant and largely irreversible changes to
species diversity

• The distribution of species on Earth is becoming
  more homogenous
• Humans have increased the species extinction rate
  by between 50 and 1,000 times over background
  rates typical over the planets history (medium
  certainty)
• 1030 of mammal, bird, and amphibian species are
  currently threatened with extinction (medium to
  high certainty)

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MA Findings - Outline

• 1. Ecosystem Changes in Last 50 Years
• 2. Gains and Losses from Ecosystem Change
• Three major problems will decrease long-term
  benefits
• Degradation of Ecosystem Services
• Increased Likelihood of Nonlinear Changes
• Exacerbation of Poverty for Some People
• 3. Ecosystem Prospects for Next 50 Years
• 4. Reversing Ecosystem Degradation

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Finding 2

• The changes that have been made to ecosystems
  have contributed to substantial net gains in
  human well-being and economic development, but
  these gains have been achieved at growing costs
• These problems will substantially diminish the
  benefits that future generations obtain from
  ecosystems.

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Changes to ecosystems have provided substantial
benefits

• Since 1960, while population doubled and economic
  activity increased 6-fold
• food production increased 2 ½ times food
  production per capita has grown and food price
  has fallen
• water use doubled
• wood harvests for pulp and paper production
  tripled
• timber production increased by more than half
• installed hydropower capacity doubled

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MA Findings - Outline

• 1. Ecosystem Changes in Last 50 Years
• 2. Gains and Losses from Ecosystem Change
• Three major problems will decrease long-term
  benefits
• Degradation of Ecosystem Services
• Increased Likelihood of Nonlinear Changes
• Exacerbation of Poverty for Some People
• 3. Ecosystem Prospects for Next 50 Years
• 4. Reversing Ecosystem Degradation

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Degradation and unsustainable use of ecosystem
services

• Approximately 60 (15 out of 24) of the ecosystem
  services evaluated in this assessment are being
  degraded or used unsustainably
• The degradation of ecosystem services often
  causes significant harm to human well-being and
  represents a loss of a natural asset or wealth of
  a country

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Status of Provisioning Services
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Status of Regulating and Cultural Services
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Degradation of ecosystem services often causes
significant harm to human well-being

• The total economic value associated with managing
  ecosystems more sustainably is often higher than
  the value associated with conversion
• Conversion often still takes place because
  private economic benefits are often greater for
  the converted system

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The degradation of ecosystem services represents
loss of a capital asset

• Loss of wealth due to ecosystem degradation is
  not reflected in economic accounts
• Ecosystem services, as well as resources such as
  mineral deposits, soil nutrients, and fossil
  fuels are capital assets
• Traditional national accounts do not include
  measures of resource depletion or of the
  degradation of these resources
• A country could cut its forests and deplete its
  fisheries, and this would show only as a positive
  gain in GDP without registering the corresponding
  decline in assets (wealth)
• A number of countries that appeared to have
  positive growth in net savings (wealth) in 2001
  actually experienced a loss in wealth when
  degradation of natural resources were factored
  into the accounts

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MA Findings - Outline

• 1. Ecosystem Changes in Last 50 Years
• 2. Gains and Losses from Ecosystem Change
• Three major problems will decrease long-term
  benefits
• Degradation of Ecosystem Services
• Increased Likelihood of Nonlinear Changes
• Exacerbation of Poverty for Some People
• 3. Ecosystem Prospects for Next 50 Years
• 4. Reversing Ecosystem Degradation

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Increased likelihood of nonlinear changes

• There is established but incomplete evidence that
  changes being made in ecosystems are increasing
  the likelihood of nonlinear and potentially
  abrupt changes in ecosystems, with important
  consequences for human well-being

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Examples of nonlinear change

• Fisheries collapse
• Eutrophication and hypoxia
• Disease emergence
• Species introductions and losses
• Regional climate change

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MA Findings - Outline

• 1. Ecosystem Changes in Last 50 Years
• 2. Gains and Losses from Ecosystem Change
• Three major problems will decrease long-term
  benefits
• Degradation of Ecosystem Services
• Increased Likelihood of Nonlinear Changes
• Exacerbation of Poverty for Some People
• 3. Ecosystem Prospects for Next 50 Years
• 4. Reversing Ecosystem Degradation

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Level of poverty remains high and inequities are
growing

• Economics and Human Development
• 1.1 billion people surviving on less than 1 per
  day of income.
• During the 1990s, 21 countries experienced
  declines in their rankings in the Human
  Development Index
• Access to Ecosystem Services
• An estimated 856 million people were
  undernourished in 20002002, up 32 million from
  199597
• Per capita food production has declined in
  sub-Saharan Africa
• Some 1.1 billion people still lack access to
  improved water supply, and more than 2.6 billion
  lack access to improved sanitation
• Water scarcity affects roughly 12 billion people
  worldwide

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Ecosystem services and poverty reduction

• Degradation of ecosystem services harms poor
  people
• Half the urban population in Africa, Asia, Latin
  America, and the Caribbean suffers from one or
  more diseases associated with inadequate water
  and sanitation
• The declining state of capture fisheries is
  reducing an inexpensive source of protein in
  developing countries. Per capita fish
  consumption in developing countries, excluding
  China, declined between 1985 and 1997
• Pattern of winners and losers has not been taken
  into account in management decisions

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Ecosystem services and poverty reduction

• Critical concern Dryland systems
• Lowest levels of human well-being
• Only 8 of the worlds renewable water supply
• Per capita water availability is two thirds of
  the level required for minimum levels of human
  well-being
• Approximately 1020 of drylands are degraded
• Experienced the highest population growth rate in
  the 1990s
• Cover 41 of Earths land surface and more than 2
  billion people inhabit them

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MA Findings - Outline

• 1. Ecosystem Changes in Last 50 Years
• 2. Gains and Losses from Ecosystem Change
• Three major problems will decrease long-term
  benefits
• Degradation of Ecosystem Services
• Increased Likelihood of Nonlinear Changes
• Exacerbation of Poverty for Some People
• 3. Ecosystem Prospects for Next 50 Years
• 4. Reversing Ecosystem Degradation

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Finding 3

• The degradation of ecosystem services could grow
  significantly worse during the first half of this
  century and is a barrier to achieving the
  Millennium Development Goals

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Direct drivers growing in intensity

• Most direct drivers of degradation in ecosystem
  services remain constant or are growing in
  intensity in most ecosystems

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MA Scenarios
Not predictions scenarios are plausible
futures Both quantitative models and qualitative
analysis used in scenario development
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Changes in direct drivers

• Habitat transformation Further 1020 of
  grassland and forestland is projected to be
  converted by 2050
• Overexploitation, overfishing
• Pressures continue to grow in all scenarios
• Invasive alien species Spread continues to
  increase

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Changes in direct driversNutrient loading

• Humans have already doubled the flow of reactive
  nitrogen on the continents, and some projections
  suggest that this may increase by roughly a
  further two thirds by 2050.
• The MA scenarios project that the global flux of
  nitrogen to coastal ecosystems will increase by a
  further 1020 by 2030, with almost all of this
  increase occurring in developing countries.

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Changes in direct driversClimate Change

• Potential future impacts
• By the end of the century, climate change and its
  impacts may be the dominant direct driver of
  biodiversity loss and changes in ecosystem
  services globally
• Net harmful impact on ecosystem services
• The balance of scientific evidence suggests that
  there will be a significant net harmful impact on
  ecosystem services worldwide if global mean
  surface temperature increases more than 2o C
  above preindustrial levels (medium certainty)

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Degradation of ecosystem services is a
significant barrier to achievement of MDGs

• Regional concerns
• Regions facing the greatest challenges in
  achieving the 2015 targets coincide with regions
  facing the greatest problems of ecosystem
  degradation sub-Saharan Africa, Central Asia,
  parts of South and Southeast Asia, and some
  regions in Latin America
• Strong linkages with ecosystem condition
• Although socioeconomic factors will play a
  primary role in achieving many of the MDGs,
  targets are unlikely to be met without
  improvement in ecosystem management for goals
  such as
• Poverty Reduction
• Hunger
• Disease
• Environmental Sustainability including access to
  water

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MA Findings - Outline

• 1. Ecosystem Changes in Last 50 Years
• 2. Gains and Losses from Ecosystem Change
• Three major problems will decrease long-term
  benefits
• Degradation of Ecosystem Services
• Increased Likelihood of Nonlinear Changes
• Exacerbation of Poverty for Some People
• 3. Ecosystem Prospects for Next 50 Years
• 4. Reversing Ecosystem Degradation

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Finding 4

• The challenge of reversing the degradation of
  ecosystems while meeting increasing demands for
  their services can be met under some scenarios
  involving significant policy and institutional
  changes, but these changes are large and not
  currently under way
• Many options exist to conserve or enhance
  specific ecosystem services in ways that reduce
  negative trade-offs or that provide positive
  synergies with other ecosystem services

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Improvements in services can be achieved by 2050

• Three of the four scenarios show that significant
  changes in policy can mitigate many of the
  negative consequences of growing pressures on
  ecosystems, although the changes required are
  large and not currently under way

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Responses Importance of Indirect Drivers

• Ecosystem degradation can rarely be reversed
  without actions that address one or more indirect
  drivers of change
• population change (including growth and
  migration)
• change in economic activity (including economic
  growth, disparities in wealth, and trade
  patterns)
• sociopolitical factors (including factors ranging
  from the presence of conflict to public
  participation in decision-making)
• cultural factors
• technological change
• Collectively these factors influence the level
  of production and consumption of ecosystem
  services and the sustainability of the
  production.

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Promising Responses

• Institutions
• Increased transparency and accountability of
  government and private-sector performance
• Economics
• Elimination of subsidies that promote excessive
  use of ecosystem services (and, where possible,
  transfer these subsidies to payments for
  non-marketed ecosystem services)
• Greater use of economic instruments and
  market-based approaches in the management of
  ecosystem services (where enabling conditions
  exist)

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Promising Responses

• Technology
• Promotion of technologies that enable increased
  crop yields without harmful impacts
• Restoration of ecosystem services
• Social and Behavioral
• Changes in consumption
• Communication and education
• Empowerment of groups dependent on ecosystem
  services
• Knowledge
• Incorporation of nonmarket values of ecosystems
  in resource management decisions
• Enhancement of human and institutional capacity

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Summary

• Over the past 50 years, humans have changed
  ecosystems more rapidly and extensively than in
  any comparable period of time in human history.
• The changes that have been made to ecosystems
  have contributed to substantial net gains in
  human well-being and economic development, but
  these gains have been achieved at growing costs
  in the form of the degradation of many ecosystem
  services, increased risks of nonlinear changes,
  and the exacerbation of poverty for some groups
  of people.
• The degradation of ecosystem services could grow
  significantly worse during the first half of this
  century and is a barrier to achieving the
  Millennium Development Goals.
• The challenge of reversing the degradation of
  ecosystems while meeting increasing demands for
  their services can be met under some scenarios
  involving significant policy and institutional
  changes, but these changes are large and not
  currently under way.

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